


Spilling Out Over Ourselves

by whiteraven1606



Series: Three [3]
Category: Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Culture Shock, Developing Relationship, Dreams and Nightmares, Dreamsharing, Multi, Past Child Abuse, Past Torture, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Pre-OT3, Recovery, Sleep Deprivation, Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-12
Updated: 2016-01-12
Packaged: 2018-05-13 08:45:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,853
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5702275
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/whiteraven1606/pseuds/whiteraven1606
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Poe finds running from rathtars exhausting even if it is only a dream, or nightmare, really.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Spilling Out Over Ourselves

****

Poe bounced between Finn's bedside with weird trooper dreams and his own bed with weird space hanger dreams. He hadn't felt this exhausted since the last time he'd done back to back supply escort missions and ended up crashed on a backwater planet with no food for a couple of weeks. 

BB-8 kept right on his heels unless Poe sent the droid off to check on their X-Wing. 

Poe hoped it wasn't noticeable that he was hiding from the General by way of wondering around the perimeter of the base during the part of the day when he wasn't trying to dream-share or whatever he was doing with a comatose Finn or trying to sleep in his own bunk, which was just resulting in him staring at his own ceiling more and more.

He sat down on a fallen log and tried to feel less like he was coming apart at the weld seams. He clenched his hands to keep them from trembling and stared up at the sky. He wasn't any good to anyone if he cracked up.

The General settled next to him on the log.

"I stop moving for two minutes and you found me."

"More like two and a half hours, but why quibble?" She took one of his hands and turned it over until he let it spread palm up in her hold. "Don't bluff me, son. Can you fly a recon for me?"

"You should probably send me with backup, General, but, yes, I can."

"Hmm." She gave him his hand back. "Medical thinks he's going to wake up soon from the rate of improvement."

Poe nodded. "That's what BB-8 told me four times this morning."

"Still calling him the coat thief?"

"Yes. I think it got stuck in the programming. I've explained a number of times, but BB-8 insists that it is Finn, the coat thief, designation: ally. I gave up changing it last week."

"R2 called Han a unflattering name for years." She smiled slightly up at the sky. "I think Han actually liked it."

Poe shifted on the log. "I'm sorry you lost him."

The General brushed a tear from the corner of her eye. "Oh. Well. I lost him a long time ago. I was happy enough he let me borrow him to begin with." She turned move towards him. "I learned not to try to change him, but I didn't quite figure out how to help him grow with me."

Poe ducked his head. "Why do I feel like you are trying to tell me something?"

She brushed a soft hand over his hair. "Maybe because I'm trying to tell you something, son." She leaned in against him for a bare moment. "You'll work it out."

"That's what my squad said a couple of weeks ago at morning meal. I'm still trying to get them to tell me what they are talking about." Poe stood up as the General did.

She caught one of his hands and squeezed. "You're exhausted. Get a medic to give you something to put you under and take it while you're out of Finn's range."

"All I've done for weeks is sleep."

"And how much of that sleeping has involved rathtars?"

Poe grimaced because running through First Order corridors from rathtars and towards Rey had been most of what he'd was doing with the child-Stormtrooper version of Finn while asleep lately. Sleeping in his own bunk just wasn't working.

The General raised an eyebrow at him. "See?"

"Alright. I get it."

She patted his shoulder and turned to head back towards the officers hovering that no one called her bodyguards, at least not where she could hear it. She looked back at him. "Mope somewhere with chairs next time. My knees are too old for damp logs."

"Yes, General." He manfully ignored that she'd called what he'd been doing moping. He'd been...thinking. Poe snorted at himself. He headed down the hill to find himself a medic. If he didn't she'd probably show up with her hands on her hips again and no one needed that.

****

He sat on the edge of his bunk and stared down at the sleeping pill. BB-8 beeped worriedly and rocked back and forth on a spot while watching him. "I'm fine, Buddy."

BB-8 disagreed and suggested they visit Finn, the coat thief, to cheer Poe up.

With a shake of his head, Poe swallowed down the pill and drank the recommended glass of water after it. "No, Buddy. We're sleeping here tonight. I need you to watch real close for me because I'm going to be really hard to wake up until the medication wears off, alright?"

He got a distressed beep and low whine before BB-8 rolled off to start patrol.

Poe flopped back on his bunk. "I'm fine!" He rolled onto his side. "I'm fine. I can do this." He pulled the blanket over himself clumsily. "I...can do this."

****

Rey flipped another switch and nodded as Chewie told her it was his turn to pilot and for her to rest. "I know. I'm moving." She went into the main cabin and ate a ration bar. It was really weird to have everyone telling her she could have what she wanted in food without exchanging anything for it. She was working out a chart of work-to-food from the amounts she'd been seeing other humans eat. She'd have a system in place in no time.

She patted R2-D2 as she disposed of the ration bar's wrapping on her way to her chosen bunk.

She frowned as that feeling of dread hit her again. She bit her lip. The math said it was start of night for the Resistance base and the dread rarely came during what would be the base's day. Rey wasn't sure what she was dreaming was real, but she'd never had the dreams she was having now before leaving Jakku.

Rey settled down on the bunk she'd been using and allowed herself to sink into the stars. _There_ was Poe in his huge Millennium Falcon shaped ship with the First Order shaped cargo bay opening in the belly. Rey walked closer, Jakku sand moving under her feet to keep her stable even though she knew she was in space.

Poe was sprawled out on the floor of the hanger just inside the forcefield with BB-8 beeping worriedly beside him. 

Rey pushed her dune as close as she could to the forcefield. "Poe!"

He didn't even twitch.

She frowned as Finn appeared with the blue lightsaber near the middle of Poe's hanger. "Finn!" She hadn't tried talking to them. She'd been standing guard for Poe because she didn't want to be invading his mind if she really was connecting with them from so far away.

Finn turned towards her. "Rey?"

She waved at him. "Finn! Poe's not moving."

He hurried across the hanger, tucking the saber away as he came. "What happened? Where am I? Last I knew I was having the rathtar memory replay again. It's gotten corrupted, but it still plays. What happened to Poe?"

Rey knelt on her side of the forcefield. "He's not moving. He usually tries to talk to you or clean up."

Finn looked at her and then around at the hangar with it's D'Qar landing ground for a floor. "Why is it two places at the same time?"

"Dreams are like that sometimes." Rey adjusted her grip on her staff. "Finn, what's wrong with him?"

Finn knelt down beside Poe and checked his pulse. He patted Poe down with quick, efficient, movements. "I don't know. He's not hurt and there's no...blood." Finn frowned at her. "I don't know."

Rey bit her lip. "What can we do?"

Finn looked around and then down at Poe. "I think...we wait?" He stood up. "I think we're...asleep?"

"You were in a coma. I've been seeing you and Poe in my dreams since I left to get _him_."

He looked at her across Poe's limp body. "Dreams?"

"Yes." She frowned. "Dreams? You know, like the one where you run from rathtars until you get cornered and the simulation ends because you get the blast door to shut fast enough."

Finn gave her a confused look. "That's a memory replay. It's been corrupted because my uniform keeps changing and lately I've been remembering Poe there, but he wasn't because that was when I was still in Phase Two and I didn't even know my own serial number that well yet."

Rey blinked several times. "I'll...remember to have Poe explain it to you later."

He frowned at her before cocking his head. "How is this a memory replay? I don't have this memory. I know I was fighting Kylo Ren to try to save you, but nothing after that. How did you get Jakku sand to float in space?"

Rey looked down at the sand under her and clutched her staff a little tighter. "You need to wake up, Finn." She stood and stared at him. "Please, Finn. _Please_ , Finn, _wake up_!"

She nearly hit her head as she jolted awake in her bunk. "Chewie!"

He roared from the cockpit.

"No! I'm fine. I just...We need to call the base. I have to talk to Poe or Finn." She hurried forward.

Chewie grumbled at her.

"I know, but I wouldn't ask if it wasn't important."

He sighed.

"Please."

Chewie barked and pointed at the map.

Rey frowned. "I suppose it can wait until we get to that system."

****

Poe struggled awake to BB-8's frantic beeping. "What? What attack...Oh. No. Hang on, I'm coming." He shook off the heavy feeling in his limbs as BB-8 kept telling him to hurry.

"Yes, Buddy. I heard you." Poe pulled on his boots and stood up as he buttoned his pants. "I don't know. They thought a few more days. How frantic?" He hurried after BB-8 as they headed for Medical at a dead run.

It was chaos. Finn was up and yelling. Droids were alternately cowering or trying to get an tranq shot into Finn, while medics were trying to calm him down by yelling louder than he was yelling himself. Finn was leaning against the wall, but upright and flailing at everyone.

Poe skidded into a medic as he tried turn the corner into Finn's room. "Finn!"

Finn wiped his head around. "You aren't dead! That's good." He collapsed to the floor. "I think I'm injured."

Poe knelt with him as a droid stuck Finn with a shot. "Yeah, Buddy, you're injured."

Finn rested his head on Poe's shoulder. "Rey was worried when you weren't moving in the memory replay. She kept calling it a dream. She said you'd explain...it to...me." He passed out.

Poe heaved while medics pulled and they managed to get Finn back onto the bed. He allowed himself to be shoo'd out while they tried to asses how much damage Finn had done to himself.

The General was standing in the corridor with her hands on her hips and no shoes.

Poe leaned against the wall by the door to Finn's room and laughed at her.

She finally cracked a smile and came to stand against the wall across from him. "Woke up?"

Poe laughed a little more before nodding. "Yeah. I think he didn't like me sleeping without him."

The General smiled and reached across to pat him on the shoulder. "Could be."

He blinked hard a couple of times. "Memory replay."

"What?"

"Finn. He called it a memory replay." Poe slid down the wall to rest on his hunches. "Kriff."

The General came closer and looked down at him. "Poe?"

Poe knocked his head gently against the wall behind him. "I think he thinks dreams are memories replaying." He looked up at the General. "They wouldn't want their troopers to know about dreams, would they?"

She raised her eyebrows. "No, I wouldn't think so." She held out a hand to him. "Up."

"Ma'am?" He cringed at the glare she leveled on him. "Sorry."

Bare feet and all, she lead him into the command center. "Find a spot and sit, Dameron."

Poe did as ordered while he watched her accept shoes from C-3PO and shushed the droid's concern for her health as she put the boots on. He frowned as she sat down near him. "Why are we here?"

"We're waiting." The General accepted reports and signed things as time seemed to crawl.

Poe did his best not to fidget and kept watch on the real time report on Finn that was in the lower corner of one of the General's nearby screens. He waited for a lull in the paperwork being brought to the General. "What are we waiting for?"

The communications officer turned and relayed there was a call for him.

"That." The General went across the room with him and the channel opened to Rey's worried, pretty, face.

"Oh! Good. I don't have to bully someone to go get you." Rey peered at him. "You look like a bantha stomped on you."

Poe grinned even as he felt like listing to port. "Thanks. You look worried. Why'd you call? Last I knew you were on signal silence."

Rey frowned. "I wouldn't have called if it wasn't important." She glanced to her right as there was roaring. "I _told_ you it was call-home important, but not turn-around-and-go-back important."

"Rey."

She turned back and looked at him. "Finn said the memory replay was corrupted, but I think he was just dreaming. I asked him to wake up when you weren't moving..."

The General crowded close. "Rey."

Rey stopped and blinked. "Hello."

She smiled. "Hello, dear. Tell me what you've been doing while you sleep, please."

Rey looked guilty as she leaned away from the pickup. "I don't..."

Poe leaned in. "Rey, it's okay. I've been trying to dream-share with Finn, so whatever you've been doing..."

"I haven't invaded! I promise!" Rey stopped and bit her lip for a moment before starting to talk again. "I've been dreaming that I'm guarding a ship that you have a huge hanger inside of."

"You had a staff. I never can figure out where you got the staff."

Rey grinned and leaned out of the frame for a moment before coming back with a staff, _the_ staff from his dreams. "I brought it with me from Jakku. You must have missed it when I was on base because I left it on the _Millennium Falcon_ for a lot of the excitement."

Poe nodded. "I keep trying to take little-trooper Finn through the blast door to you, but it never works."

"I think that ended the simulation in his real life so it wakes you up? I'm not sure."

The General leaned in again. "Rey, you need to not reach for Finn or Poe until after you've gotten to your destination."

Rey frowned. "Why?"

She sighed. "Reaching through space can disturb the balance of the Force. While the First Order is regrouping and we're trying to find a new base, since this one and the backup are compromised, there's not much danger at the moment, but it becomes more dangerous with each passing day."

Rey's lips thinned as she frowned harder. "I need to protect them."

"I understand that." The General tugged Poe more into frame. "He isn't resting, Rey. And neither are you."

She tucked her loose curl behind her ear. "Can...Once I get there can I call?"

The General smiled. "Maybe not call, but you should try reaching for them then. And don't warn anyone before you do it. Just the once, mind."

There was a roar and bark from off-screen.

The General laughed. "Oh, he totally deserves it, Chewie. Keep her safe for us, my friend."

There was another bark.

Rey hunched her shoulders as she looked at Poe. "I'm sorry you've not been able to rest."

Poe shrugged. "I'll sleep when I'm dead." He cringed as the General smacked him up the backside of his head. "Which will be a long time from now, I'm sure."

She snorted as Rey tried not to laugh at him.

Rey leaned in. "Be safe? And take care of him? And yourself."

Poe nodded. "We'll be here. Or, you know, a new base, or well..."

She laughed and waved as he did until the feed cut out.

The General pressed in on him from the side. "Time for all wayward pilots to properly sleep."

"I've been sleeping." Poe let himself be handed off to someone big and solid. Oh, look, it was Snap. "Properly and everything. Took a pill to prove it."

"Uh huh." Snap took them somewhere so swiftly that Poe didn't even try to track it. "You aren't supposed to wake up most of the way through a dosed sleep, Dameron. You're one stubborn flyboy. How are you even still standing?"

Poe listed to port as they turned a corner. "Sheer ego?"

"Hah! I'm going to remind you of this later."

"Doesn't count. I'm...drugged." Poe saw his door. "Ooooh. Bunk!"

"Almost, Dameron. Don't collapse just yet. Dameron!"

****


End file.
